Modern history
- Napoleon I (Napoleon Bonaparte) (pictured) was not particularly short,[38][not in citation given] and did not have a Napoleon complex. After his death in 1821, the French emperor’s height was recorded as 5 feet 2 inches in French feet. This corresponds to 5 feet 6.5 inches in modern international feet, or 1.686 metres.[39][40] Some believe that he was nicknamed le Petit Caporal (The Little Corporal) as a term of affection.[41]
- According to Time magazine, there is a common misconception among Americans that Abraham Lincoln freed the American slaves with the Emancipation Proclamation of January 1863.[42] Flagging fortunes in the spring and summer of 1862 brought the threat of European intervention on behalf of the Confederacy. Lincoln argued that turning a fight to crush rebellion into a crusade against slavery would not only end the European threat, as no Continental power would want to be seen supporting slavery, but would also sway abolitionists into supporting the administration. Slaves were not immediately freed as a result of the Proclamation as it only applied to rebelling states not under Union control. Additionally, the prolamation did not apply to parts of rebelling states already under Union control.[43] The Proclamation did not cover the 800,000 slaves in the Union's slave-holding border states of Missouri, Kentucky, West Virginia, Maryland or Delaware. As the regions in the South that were under Confederate control ignored the Proclamation, slave ownership persisted until Union troops captured further Southern territory. It was only with the adoption of the Thirteenth Amendment in 1865 that slavery was officially abolished in all of the United States. Thirty-six of the United States recognize June 19 as a holiday, Juneteenth, celebrating the anniversary of the day the abolition of slavery was announced in Texas in 1865.
- The Great Chicago Fire of 1871 was not caused by Mrs. O'Leary's cow kicking over a lantern. A newspaper reporter made it up because he thought it would make colorful copy.[44]
- Italian dictator Benito Mussolini did not "make the trains run on time". Much of the repair work had been performed before Mussolini and the Fascists came to power in 1922. Accounts from the era also suggest that the Italian railways' legendary adherence to timetables was more myth than reality.[45]
- During and after World War II, there were persistent reports that scrap steel from the demolition of New York's Sixth Avenue El was sold to Japan, and was used to make ammunition that killed American soldiers. But the contract for sale of the scrap metal prohibited export to any country, and the contract was strictly enforced.[46][47][48]
- During the German Invasion of Poland in 1939, there is no evidence of Polish Cavalry mounting a brave but futile charge against German tanks using lances and sabres. This seems to have its origins in German propaganda efforts following the Charge at Krojanty in which a Polish cavalry brigade surprised German infantry in the open and charged with sabres until driven off by armoured cars. While Polish cavalry still carried the sabre for such opportunities, they were trained to fight as highly mobile, dismounted infantry and issued with light anti-tank weapons.[49][50]
- During World War II, King Christian X of Denmark did not thwart Nazi attempts to identify Jews by wearing a yellow star himself. Jews in Denmark were never forced to wear the Star of David. The Danes did help most Jews flee the country before the end of the war.[51][52][53]
- Albert Einstein did not fail mathematics in school, as is commonly believed. Upon being shown a column claiming this fact, Einstein said "I never failed in mathematics... Before I was fifteen I had mastered differential and integral calculus."[54][55]
- U.S. Senator George Smathers never gave a speech to a rural audience describing his opponent, Claude Pepper, as an "extrovert" whose sister was a "thespian", in the apparent hope they would confuse them with similar-sounding words like "pervert" and "lesbian". Time, which is sometimes cited as the source, described the story of the purported speech as a "yarn" at the time,[56] and no Florida newspaper reported such a speech during the campaign. The leading reporter who covered Smathers said he always gave the same boilerplate speech. Smathers had offered $10,000 to anyone who could prove he had made the speech, and he died in 2007 with the money still in his bank account.[57]
- John F. Kennedy's words "Ich bin ein Berliner" are standard German for "I am a Berliner".[58][59] An urban legend has it that due to his use of the indefinite article ein, Berliner is translated as jelly doughnut, and that the population of Berlin was amused by the supposed mistake. The word Berliner is not commonly used in Berlin to refer to the Berliner Pfannkuchen; they are usually called ein Pfannkuchen.[60]
- Eva Perón never uttered the quote "I will return and I will be millions". The quote was first formulated by the indigenous leader Túpac Katari in 1781 shortly before being executed. The misattribution to Eva Perón originates from a poem by José María Castiñeira de Dios written in Eva Perón's first-person narrative, written nearly ten years after her death. However, it is unclear why the poet used the quote, which also could have been inspired by a similar quote in theSpartacus contemporary film.[61]
No comments:
Post a Comment